Drum set, screeching microphone, dazzling neon lights that drizzle the room and evoke an insatiable buzz.
They're all drunk. The bar's the busiest part of this run-down, half-assed excuse of a club. Tom doesn't care, though. He's not here for the grinding bodies, nor for the sticky floors, cheap alcohol, groping hands, or pressing cigarette breaths either.
Jesse stands center of the stage. The set's yet to begin and Tom can see him going through the list of songs he's playing from the band's new EP. He'd think Jesse wasn't nervous at all if he hadn't been watching him for so long. The blue light swings over his long hair as he pushes it back with his thin fingers. He's in his favorite leather jacket, adorned with all sorts of ornate pins, collected over the years. Underneath, he's in a loose black t-shirt, v-neck subtle but sharp enough to reveal a set of silver chained necklaces hanging around his neck like tokens belonging to an extinct Ancient tribe. Or the gang that loiters around just a few blocks away from Tom's apartment building.
Three, two, one, and Tom can swear the crowd falls silent at the first opening guitar riff. Jesse's nodding his head, and his newly acquired neck tattoo stands out beneath his jacket's collars. It's a few heartbeats before he parts his lips and starts to sing, and then the crowd starts yelling along and Tom bites his lips to stop himself from grinning like a fool. Slowly, he pushes himself between the crowded people at the front, until he stands close enough so that when Jesse looks up from the guitar strapped across his shoulder, he catches Tom's gaze and grins like a werewolf underneath the full moon.
The speakers are pulsing, pushing sound not only through Tom's ears but he can also feel it travel through his veins, to where his heart starts to thud, thud, thud. He mouths the words he's already had memorized, and when the lights dim a half-hour later, his tongue is heavy and his throat is raw.
Jesse is backstage, wiping sweat from his forehead using the edge of his t-shirt, nodding along to something someone says. Tom likes seeing him this way, right after a show's high when Jesse looks like he's flying miles up in the clouds. His cheeks are flushed, and his body is relaxed like someone's stretched his muscles out and shook him loose.
"Hey," he nods in his direction when he notices Tom by the backstage entrance. Restricted, it says in bold red, along with scratched out band stickers and old flyers still taped to the door. "How was it?"
Tom hands him a cold water bottle, watches the bob of Jesse's Adam's apple as he chugs the liquid down. "You suck."
"This is why I like having you around. You're my best critic."
"I joke," Tom smiles.
Jesse looks around, then tilts his head. "Come here."
There's a back exit to the stage, and the cold air slams into them like a wall of ice. Jesse pulls out a cigarette from his pocket and cups his hands as he lights it up.
"How was it really?" He tilts his head to look at Tom from the side.
"I think maybe one of your best."
Jesse looks towards the streetlights and nods. "You're my good luck charm."
"I doubt it."
"Come with me on tour," he says, exhaling a puff.
Tom takes the cigarette and eyes it with disdain. Then he takes a puff before handing it back. "You're a bad influence."
"Come with me and I'll show you, you're the reason why."
Tom doesn't ask . He knows of this conspiracy. Jesse's almost frantic now to have him at his shows, for it was the night Tom stood front row that an agent happened to wander into an invisible bar. Tom was humming along when they'd had to impress others from the record label. Tom was mocking Jesse's guitar riffs when he'd made the latter man smile and someone had snapped the picture that'd soon plagued the front page of every local newspaper.
Tom passes the cigarette back. "Is this why you keep my around?"
Jesse inhales, exhales, the V widens and reveals more skin. "You've already moved in with me."
"If you're using me I'll slit your throat and leave you to bleed," but Tom doesn't mean it. The words feel like cotton under his tongue.
Jesse drops the cigarette and runs his fingers through Tom's hair, touches his ear for a moment. "Do I have to get down on my knees?"
Tom leans in and kisses him, just because he knows waiting would only drive him wild. Their lips touch briefly.
"Is that a yes?"
Tom thinks of New York and Paris. Hotel rooms, maybe. Tight-fit tour buses and sharing beds seems more so the reality. He kisses, kisses, kisses. Their lips part and their tongues slide, and Tom only wants to think of nothing at all.
"Later," he says, when he means kiss me now, because his nails ache for skin to scratch, and his lips feel hotter than fire.
"Later means never and when the plane flies high I can only dream of seeing you again," Jesse says in his ears, so even if they weren't alone out here in the cold, still no one would hear.
"That's not true."
Tom kisses his neck, he kisses down to the cold chains, to the sharp pointed V, cold lips and warm skin. He thinks he feels Jesse's heartbeat, but he can't tell when all he can hear is his own.
His fingers slip beneath the leather, then underneath the soft cotton so he feels an elastic band and warmer skin still. "I would only distract you."
Jesse stretches his neck and squeezes his eyes. "You're the only thing that keeps me grounded."
"What would you do if I stayed?"
His long fingers stretch, they twist and they turn until they are shapeless. "I would have to unlearn you. Take you apart like loose string. You would never know me again."
"I don't want that."
His eyes open again, clear windows, clean mirrors. Their fingers lace together, and Tom wonders if Jesse knew his answer all along. He must have known.
Idk
I'm reading call me by your name (no spoilers pls i havent seen the movie yet either and im only halfway through the book--i will literally block u if u even try bish i take this seriously) and it's really screwing me up
xx
